Faster, cleaner, smarter: Welcome to the new Digital Trends

By way of introduction, some full disclosure: I am not what you would call a gadget freak or a tech obsessive. I only have an iPhone 5 because my 3G (note the lack of an ‘S’) was long overdue for an upgrade; I have a fancypants MacBook Air only by the good graces of this company, and I don’t own a tablet because I still haven’t figured out a use for one beyond watching TV in bed. Speaking of TVs, my apartment sports a 37-inch Westinghouse LED that I bought at a pawn shop (decent picture, but it sounds like an asthmatic with emphysema), and my home audio system consists of a 300-dollar Toshiba sound bar that brings the number of remote controls on the coffee table to five. Supposedly, there’s a way to make them all run through the DirecTV one, but I’ve gone grey trying to sort that out.

All of which begs the reasonable question: What am I doing leading the editorial charge of Digital Trends’ great leap forward? In short, I’m going to try and sort it out.

Over the course of the last four years, DT has grown into one of the largest tech news and product review sites on the Web. Our reviewers, writers, and editors have a byte-level understanding of the devices and apps that seem to multiply by the day, and they provide advice and insight in plain English on what to buy and how to use it. They constantly parse the endless rumormongering that is the product news cycle to separate the signal from the noise. And they dive deep into the increasingly thorny questions created by our ever-digitizing lives in search of answers.

But that’s only the beginning.

In the coming months, we’ll explore gadgets and technology from every angle imaginable; from how they power major sporting events to what devices are in the pockets of war correspondents. We’ll introduce new ways to review the latest products that move beyond simple ratings and long-winded explanations. We’ll go room by room through your home with advice on how to make the “House Of The Future” real today. And we’ll roll out new tools that help you maximize the products you own and help make your purchasing decisions fast, efficient, and custom-tailored to your needs.

We’ll do all this from a standpoint that is all too often lost these days, when computer coders are rockstars and product designers are the captains of industry: Yours. I’m guessing that you have a healthy appreciation for the gadgets and tech in your life, but they’re additive rather than central. You probably enjoy that initial buzz of a new toy, but then appreciate it most when it’s simply in the background, working. You know your way around your system preferences, but don’t have time to keep up with every upgrade and app coming down the pipe. And you still need to do a quick search to decipher the latest acronym (we’re looking at you, OLED). In short, you’re a little like me.

So welcome to the new Digital Trends. We’re leaving the geek ghetto, and we’re bringing you with us. Let’s start sorting this stuff out …